Chiswick High Road, Chiswick, London Borough of Hounslow

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1 Chiswick High Road, Chiswick, London Borough of Hounslow An Archaeological Watching Brief For HBG Properties by James McNicoll-Norbury Thames Valley Archaeological Services Ltd Site Code CIG 07 August 2008

2 Summary Site name: Chiswick High Road, Chiswick, London Borough of Hounslow Grid reference: TQ Site activity: Watching Brief Date and duration of project: 21st 29th July 2008 Project manager: Steve Ford Site supervisor: James McNicoll-Norbury Site code: CIG 07 Area of site: c hectares (128sq m observed) Summary of results: No finds or deposits of any archaeological interest were observed. Location and reference of archive: The archive is presently held at Thames Valley Archaeological Services, Reading and will be deposited at the Museum of London in due course with accession code CIG07. This report may be copied for bona fide research or planning purposes without the explicit permission of the copyright holder Report edited/checked by: Steve Ford Steve Preston i Thames Valley Archaeological Services Ltd, De Beauvoir Road, Reading RG1 5NR Tel. (0118) ; Fax (0118) ; tvas@tvas.co.uk; website :

3 Introduction Chiswick High Road, Chiswick, London Borough of Hounslow An Archaeological Watching Brief by James McNicoll-Norbury Report 07/78c This report documents the results of an archaeological watching brief carried out at Chiswick High Road, Chiswick, London Borough of Hounslow (TQ ) (Fig. 1). The work was commissioned by Mr Andrew Josephs of Andrew Josephs Ltd, Environmental Consultants, 16 South Terrace, Sowerby, Thirsk, YO7 1RH on behalf of HBG properties, Chaucer House, 13/14 Cork Street, London, W19 3NS. Planning consent (app no P/2007/3007) has been gained from the London Borough of Hounslow to redevelop the site for a new office building and residential accommodation. The consent is subject to a condition (21) requiring a programme of archaeological investigation. Field evaluation across part of the site (Taylor 2007) failed to locate any features or finds of archaeological interest, but was unable to examine the area thought to be of highest archaeological potential. It was decided that the removal of below-ground fuel tanks on the site should be archaeologically monitored in order to fulfill condition 21. This is in accordance with the Department of the Environment s Planning Policy Guidance, Archaeology and Planning (PPG ), and the Borough s policies on archaeology. The field investigation was carried out to a specification approved by Ms Kim Stabler, Archaeology Adviser with the Greater London Archaeology Advisory service. The fieldwork was undertaken by Julian Newman and James McNicoll-Norbury between 21st to 29th July 2008 and the site code is CIG 07. The archive is presently held at Thames Valley Archaeological Services, Reading and will be deposited at the Museum of London in due course. Location, topography and geology The site is located on the north side of Chiswick High Road. Thorney Hedge Road lies on the western side of the site with the remainder being bounded by housing (Fig. 2). The site was previously occupied by an office building and car parking and is a relatively flat parcel of land. The underlying geology is mapped as brickearth, in an area also showing first river gravels over London clay (BGS 1981), the geology observed was sandy clay (brickearth) in all areas with gravel patches in the area covered by Tank A. The site lies at a height of c. 10m above Ordnance Datum. 1

4 Archaeological background The archaeological potential of the site has been highlighted in a desk-based assessment (Preston 2007). In summary, the site lies close to a significant prehistoric site, at the nearby former Bus Works, which may have extended onto this site, while Chiswick High Road itself is on the projected route of the Roman road from London to Silchester. It is possible therefore that Roman roadside occupation or burial could have been present. Various finds and sites are recorded from near to the site with multi-period finds and deposits recorded from an excavation carried out to the north-east of the site. (MoLAS 2000). However, field evaluation on the site encountered only modern made ground, foundations and services above the natural geology (Taylor 2007). Objectives and methodology The purpose of the watching brief was to excavate and record any archaeological deposits affected by intrusive groundworks in the areas of the site not covered by the evaluation, in particular the area occupied by the below ground fuel tanks which were still live at the time of the evaluation. Results Three fuel tanks surrounding by a concrete casing were present on the site (Fig. 3). These were removed and by a 360 o machine fitted with a toothless ditching bucket under constant archaeological observation. The three areas (A C) dug ranging from m long and m wide and were between 2.2m and 3.85m deep (Fig. 3). No archaeological deposits were identified in these three areas. Tank A The excavation for this tank measured 5.5m long by 4.2m wide and 2.90m deep. The stratigraphy consisted of Tarmac overlying brick rubble made ground. In turn this was overlying black brown silty clay with a more orange brown silty clay directly beneath it which in turn overlay a layer of crushed brick and tile that was overlying sandy clay natural geology. No archaeological finds or deposits were observed. Tank B The excavation for this tank measured 7.5m long by 3.0m wide and 2.20m deep. The stratigraphy consisted of Tarmac overlying brick rubble made ground, above brown silty clay which in turn overlay a layer of crushed brick and tile that was overlying sandy clay natural geology. No archaeological finds or deposits were observed. 2

5 Tank C The excavation for this tank measured 9.83m long by 8.4m wide and 3.85m deep. In the south facing section the stratigraphy consisted of Tarmac overlying brick rubble made ground. In turn this was overlying a layer of bricks which in turn overlay a large layer of made ground that was broken up by a large modern service pipe, this in turn overlay sandy clay natural geology (Fig. 4). In the east facing section the stratigraphy consisted of Tarmac over brick rubble made ground. In turn this was overlying, on the southern edge of the section, dark brown silty clay and on the north side of the section the foundation of the previous building which consisted of brick above dark gravelly silty clay. Both of these layers in turn overlay sandy clay natural geology. No archaeological finds or deposits were observed. Finds No finds of archaeological interest were retrieved during the fieldwork. Conclusion Despite the possibility of the site s lying close to the projected line of a Roman road, and close to a prehistoric site, no deposits or finds of any archaeological period were observed during the watching brief. References BGS, 1981, British Geological Survey, 1:50000, Sheet 270, Solid and Drift Edition, Keyworth MoLAS, 2000, The archaeology of Greater London; an assessment of archaeological evidence for human presence in the area now covered by Greater London, Museum of London Archaeology Service Monogr PPG 16, 1990, Archaeology and Planning, Dept of the Environment Planning Policy Guidance 16, HMSO Preston, S, 2007, Lovell House, Chiswick High Road, Chiswick, London Borough of Hounslow: an archaeological desk-based assessment, Thames Valley Archaeological Services report 07/78, Reading Taylor, A, 2007, Lovell House, Chiswick High Road, Chiswick, London Borough of Hounslow: an archaeological evaluation, Thames Valley Archaeological Services report 07/78b, Reading 3

6 SITE SITE TQ Chiswick High Road, Chiswick, London Borough of Hounslow, 2008 Archaeological watching brief CIG 07 Figure 1. Location of site within Chiswick and Greater London. Reproduced from Ordnance Survey Explorer 161 at 1:12500 Ordnance Survey Licence

7 78600 N SITE TQ Chiswick High Road, Chiswick, London Borough of Houndslow, 2008 Archaeological watching brief CIG 07 Figure 2. Detailed location of site off Chiswick High Road. Crown copyright reserved. Scale 1:1250

8 Chiswick High Road, Chiswick, London Borough of Hounslow, 2008 N SITE y Thorne oad Hedge R A 5 2 scent Silver Cre 4 6 B Demolition in progress C 7 H Chiswick igh Road TQ m Figure 3: Location of tank removals (A-C), with previous evaluation trenches shown. CIG 07

9 Chiswick High Road, Chiswick, London Borough of Hounslow, 2008 SSE NNW/WSW ENE concrete Tarmac brick rubble (made ground) 9.8mAOD Dark brown silty clay dark clay and gravel Brick foundation backfill of service dark clay and brick frags (made ground) Yellow sand clay (natural geology) base of excavation 0 10m Figure 4. Section of area C CIG 07

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